


an ultraviolet way

by majorrager



Category: Life Is Strange (Video Game)
Genre: Consent, Dirty Talk, F/F, First Time, Healing, Hurt/Comfort, Intimacy, Post-Canon, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Trust Issues
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-10-03
Updated: 2015-10-03
Packaged: 2018-04-24 10:39:15
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,440
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4916323
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/majorrager/pseuds/majorrager
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Regardless of how it comes about, it always produces the same result: Max colliding with a barrier that stops her from going any further with Chloe. It's a wall that exists solely in the most abstract sense, its structure sound only within the confines of her own skull.</p><p>Max wants Chloe so badly. She wishes that wanting her were enough.</p>
            </blockquote>





	an ultraviolet way

**Author's Note:**

> A major reason I wanted to write this piece was because I wanted to write hurt/comfort, girls getting messy with each other, imperfect, kind of sloppy sex, and Chloe with nipple piercings and a dirty mouth. So if you're into those things, you'll find them here. The porn gets kind of vulgar; I'm not sorry.
> 
> The other reason I wanted to write this was to explore some of the intimacy issues, boundaries, and compromised ideas of consent that can come with suffering physical and/or sexual trauma. I haven't elaborated on Max's experience in this, both because we haven't reached episode 5 and because I feel that it is completely unnecessary to the fic as a whole; you can interpret it in whatever way makes you most comfortable. Her trauma isn't what matters here; it's how she processes it.

Chloe is sucking her way up the slope of Max's neck when it rolls through her, rippling out from deep within her guts and shuddering through the rest of her body, turning her muscles to cement and her nerves to frayed wires. Her mouth moves soundlessly, unable to understand what the sensation is— and then it redoubles, flooding her veins with revulsion.  
  
"Stop," she breathes, but Chloe doesn't seem to hear her, because she keeps mouthing at her throat. The oxygen starts to draw tight in Max's chest, like it's just dissipating away within her, but she says, a second time, "Stop. _Chloe._ " Her wrists jump, and her hands squeeze into Chloe's shoulders.  
  
Chloe jerks back immediately. She looks a little bit confused, maybe somewhat wary, like she expects to be rejected by Max, somehow, even five minutes into making out with her. Max doesn't know what to say to her. She just lays there against the pillows, her damp skin sticking her hair to her face, and tries to stop reeling. A shadow seems to pass imperceptibly over Chloe's face, and then her expression changes.  
  
"Oh," she whispers, and then, louder, " _oh_ , Max, _fuck_ , I'm sorry—"  
  
Everything goes a little watery, and Chloe's hard to make out, just a soft blur of electric blue and pale skin. It's as though Chloe's recognition eases away the shock and the physical disgust, and Max can now think clearly about it: _Again_ , is the thought. _Again. It happened again._  
  
"I'm sorry," she says thickly, shaking her head hard. "I'm sorry, Chloe. I don't know why I keep..."  
  
"No, Max. Shut up. _Your_ turn to stop now." Chloe's hands are in the air, as if defensively, but the look on her face makes it obvious that she's trying hard to play this one off— to keep her usual air of aloofness, to make it seem like this isn't a big deal, when Max knows it is. Chloe's already moving back, gently placing her palms onto Max's knees and reminding her to stretch out, that they don't have to continue, that the mood is broken anyway.  
  
Max sits up on the couch. She's still shuddering. It feels like something's crawling all over her. The guilt tastes acidic, rising in her throat and souring her mouth. _Every time_ , she thinks angrily. _Every time, I..._ She draws her knees to her chest and tugs her t-shirt back into place, feeling sticky and ashamed all over. She can barely look at Chloe. She'd _wanted_ this. It had been going fine. They'd been getting a little sleepy, and she'd been leaning into Chloe, and eventually the movie had become background noise to her, and Max had turned her attention to Chloe's gently illuminated profile as she kept watching _The Shining_ with a smile. It had taken several minutes for Chloe to notice her, and when she had, she'd leaned in to kiss her, and it had felt _right_ , and when Chloe had said, _Can I_? Max had eagerly allowed her to crawl on top of her body, and she'd thought... _This time_...  
  
It's just like last time, and the time before that, and the one before _that_ , times when everything had been going fine until fear had exploded inside of Max's chest, making her heart race and her head spin and nausea boil in her abdomen. Every time, there has been a sudden, violent stopping point, and Max still can't identify a pattern: was it when Chloe's hand had roamed too high or too low on her chest? Was it when Max had pressed her crotch to her thigh? Had it been the sweep of Chloe's tongue on her throat? Was it the way her fingernails had felt sliding beneath Max's jeans?  
  
Regardless of how it comes about, it always produces the same result: Max colliding with a barrier that stops her from going any further with Chloe. It's a wall that exists solely in the most abstract sense, its structure sound only within the confines of her own skull.  
  
She's paralyzed where she is, arms locked like a vice around her knees. Chloe's watching her, her teeth working at her lower lip, and she says, "We should just crash for the night."  
  
"I _wanted_ to, Chloe," Max pleads, lifting her chin, and she _knows_ she doesn't have to justify herself, that Chloe would never ask her to, but it seems so important somehow to keep reiterating it. It's always like this, with her apologizing, not knowing what's broken inside of her or why she can't just fix it when she genuinely wants to. It's always _I'm sorry, Chloe. I want you, but I don't know why I can't let myself have you. I'm sorry. I'm sorry._  
  
"I know," says Chloe bluntly. Predictably, she isn't happy with Max trying to apologize. She never is. "You know it's not, like— it's not something I even want if it's going to be like this for you."  
  
"Yeah," Max struggles to say. "I get that, but I—"  
  
"I mean it, Max. We don't have to even think about that stuff ever again if you don't want to." Chloe reaches for the remote control. She turns the television off before she stands, her thighs taut through the gaps of skin Max can see in the tears of her jeans.  
  
_I do_ , she wants to say, but Chloe's already reached her conclusion. She doesn't seem hurt by it, but maybe that's just Max hoping for too much as she searches her face.  
  
Max wants Chloe so badly. She wishes that wanting her were enough. 

   
  


The next morning, Chloe's already out at her part time job. There's a text from her waiting on Max's phone when she checks it as she gets ready for her own day — _left rest of pancakes for you_ — and, after she puts her sweater on, she presses _CALL_ , passing through the kitchen to grab a pancake that she leaves plain.  
  
"Hey," says Chloe as soon as she picks up.  
  
"Are you busy?" Max's mouth is dry as she nibbles.  
  
"Like there's ever anyone in the store." Chloe seems happy to have someone to talk to; Max knows that she gets bored at work a lot. "You should see the weird fucking shit we just got in, though. Some eccentric rich old lady just dropped off, like, her entire wardrobe. There's this dress that _has_ to have been someone's sad art school project from the 80s. Imagine this wrinkly red taffeta and giant bright blue beads all over the shoulders and this, like, velvet sash across the waist? Extremely vogue. I kind of want to take it home. I'm pretty sure it's what Carrie would have worn in the everyone-dies scene if she had gone to Blackwell."  
  
"Carrie?" Max repeats. "Don't aspire to that."  
  
"Don't tell me what to do! Oh my god. We're going to be watching that when I get home."  
  
Max has already seen it; between Chloe and Warren, she's never going to get to see a lighthearted film ever again, but she smiles a little. "Yeah, sure. But you're not bringing that dress back with you."  
  
"Well, you just fucked _that_ idea in the ass," says Chloe, with some disappointment.  
  
"Gross, Chloe," says Max, her hand tightening on the phone, but Chloe's vulgarity reminds her of why she's calling. "Hey, I..." She stops there. Silence. She can hear Chloe breathing on the other end, the sounds of the shop behind her. She's waiting for Max to continue; she forces herself to. "I wanted to say I'm sorry about last night."  
  
"Are you still on that shit? _Jesus._ " Max can hear her sigh, but it sounds a little distant, like Chloe is holding the phone out away from her mouth. Her voice fades in louder as she continues. "You being so crazy insecure about it is, I think, like a million times worse than however the cockblocking makes me feel. Don't get hung up on that part. I swear my junk can handle it."  
  
This is a conversation they've had before. Max's throat feels like it's swelling up. "I _know_. But other couples have sex." Her voice comes out sounding small and childish to her ears.  
  
"Other couples also, like, flog the shit out of each other for fun." Chloe pauses, then adds, hastily, "Not that I'm kinkshaming. Or implying anything. Please don't think that I want you to whip me, seriously. It's just that we _really_ don't have to do something because other people make it seem like we should. Or whatevs. Y'know?"  
  
Max starts picking crumbs off of the pancake, letting them fall into her lap in a pile. She's going to be late for work. "But I _want_ to."  
  
"You keep saying that, but your body's telling you you're not ready. And that's fine. Honest. It's not like I _have_ to be asexual." Chloe sounds a little amused. "Max, I jerk off like three times a day. I was doing that before I hooked up with you, and getting with you hasn't exactly changed my routine."  
  
"Uh," says Max. "I know." Chloe isn't exactly subtle about it, which Max kind of loves. Sometimes she'll even touch herself when they're kissing, and Max is okay with that, because it means Chloe's keeping her hands to herself. She wishes she could help, that she could reach out and touch her back, become the reason she's groaning and rolling her hips. "I just wish I could... so that we could finally..."  
  
"I get it," says Chloe, after a delay. She sounds thoughtful. "Is it some kind of, uh, like, okay, this is going to sound dumb, but it's like a... You want to have that experience with someone, 'cause it feels like it could be the one way you could, like, be as close as you can with them? That sounds stupid. But you get it, right?"  
  
"Shit," murmurs Max, somewhat miserably. "I don't know."  
  
Chloe is right. She's felt like she hasn't given enough of herself over to her. It's a form of self loathing that is entirely new to her.  
  
"We could drop this," suggests Chloe. Her voice is firm. "You don't have to dwell on it every time. It happened. Uh, I mean, it _didn't_ happen, but the fact that it didn't happen... happened? Oh, whatever. The point is that we don't have to talk about it, and when we both get home today we'll watch Carrie, and I'll have you totally a horror expert by the time Halloween rolls around. Cool?"  
  
Max puts her phone on speaker mode and wraps her arms around herself. Tight. Tighter. Trying to press every phantom memory out of her skin.  
  
"Alright," she says. 

   
  


Although she hasn't been able to reverse the stream of time for almost a year now, Max still finds herself reliving moments over and over anyway. They come back to her at the strangest times— sometimes she sees something, a photograph or a poster, and she'll remember. Or she'll hear something, like the click of a camera shutter, and she'll have to stop whatever she's doing. Or someone will make the mistake of startling her from behind, a greeting or a tap of the shoulder. The fear will turn her to stone and shatter her, but not before she lashes out in self defense. She's hurt people like that before.  
  
But mostly they come to her when she's with Chloe. When Chloe's hands tighten around her wrists. Or that one time Chloe had pressed her fingers to her lips and said, _Shh_. Or when she presses her weight into Max, seals her against the wall or the bed or her chair, caging her in. Or when the physical closeness of it all proves to be too much, far too much, and Max can't do anything but shove her away, gasping.  
  
It's a cycle, like pressing reset over and over, like tracing back down the spiral to the very beginning and experiencing the fear and terror in the exact same ways every time.  
  
Chloe always tells her that it's fine, that they could go their whole lives without ever having sex, and that she'd be fine with that. Max is used to Chloe being selfish in every other aspect of her life, and she wishes that she would be selfish here, too, because her patience is somehow devastating. An ugly part of her wants Chloe to destroy her for being inadequate, wants her to lash out and punish her for it. It hurts to resent Chloe for not resenting her more.  
  
The spiral tunnels down into Max's core.

   
  


Chloe had started working on her GED around the time Max had decided that she would just take a gap year. The gap year had been, and still is, an easy decision; Max doesn't know what she wants to do or where she wants to go. Before, she'd had an idea of what she wanted — stay at Blackwell another year, put a solid portfolio together — but now, she just doesn't know. She tells herself that that's okay. She tells herself that the one thing she has an excess of is time to decide.  
  
After some negotiation, Max's parents had agreed to help her rent a small apartment in Seattle after extricating a promise that she could hold a full time job for the duration of her gap year. The conversation about whether or not Chloe would be coming along hadn't actually happened at any point: Chloe had just accompanied her, like that was that, and she had done a pretty good job of acting like moving away from Joyce — and maybe even David — hadn't upset her in the slightest. Even more than half a year onward, Max still sees her make a daily phone call home. The distance seems to have actually improved her relationship with her parents, like all the Price-Madsen household had needed was room to breathe and to learn to appreciate one another.  
  
Max has a job in a tourist shop down by the waterfront, and she walks every day through the market under the grey skies she has come to love about Seattle. It's a beautiful place to work on her photography, especially in the fall— soft yellow awnings and grime baked into the bricks and deep blue water spread out like glass. She always feels transcendent standing there overlooking the water, watching the sun shine cold through the dark clouds. Sometimes, she expects to look out onto Elliott Bay and see a storm churning above the ocean. It never happens. She has to actively remind herself that she's never going to have to see something like that again.  
  
Being in constant proximity with Chloe makes a lot of things easier. It makes it easier, for one, to recognize when Chloe wants attention — which is most of the time — and when she needs solitude so that she can blow off steam. It makes it easier to navigate Chloe's volatile moods, to learn what pleases and disappoints her, to find shortcuts to all the things that make her happiest. Chloe isn't _easy_ to be around, but it's definitely not hard, and maybe Max doesn't always have to like her to love her.  
  
Chloe works harder than Max does. She seems to be trying to make up for the years she'd given up to loss and the depression that had followed, like she's trying to get back all of the emotional development she'd willfully passed by. She's so _good_. Max is constantly impressed by her inherent kindness, awed by her sincerity, by her utter honesty at all times. Maybe Chloe has had her problems, but she's never been anything but transparent. She's the most real person Max knows, a total open wound. Chloe thinks she's tough, but she's not, and that's why Max loves her.  
  
It's easier to sleep through the night when Chloe's around, and Max wonders if that's not why she's with her. Chloe insists that it's because she couldn't wait to get the hell out of Arcadia Bay, and Max believes that, but she wonders if Chloe's reasons run deeper than that, especially on the difficult nights. Chloe's always right there next to her, ready to talk her through it, and at the rare occasions that Chloe allows herself to be vulnerable, to feel her hurt, Max tries to return the favor. Chloe's been dealing with her problems for years; Max feels like hers are ridiculous and overly needy in comparison. But Chloe never looks at her any differently, or pitifully. Maybe that's because she understands.  
  
But still. She wants to be more for Chloe. Everything always feels so good, so _right_ , except for the moments Chloe presses a little too close or holds her a little too tight and the walls start coming in on Max's heart, making her feel like her body doesn't belong to her but belongs to someone else's hands instead.  
  
Every time she tries to talk about it with Chloe, she can't get the words to come out right. Chloe tells her that they don't have to talk about it at all. Max doesn't agree, but she refrains. Instead, she decides to figure out what to do about it.

   
  


On her nineteenth birthday, Chloe tells her that they're going to make the drive up to Vancouver. Max asks her if it's because she wants to be able to order a drink with her dinner. Chloe gives her her best offended face, and Max laughs her ass off. It turns out to be completely true, of course, and Chloe winds up overdoing it at the bar. Max ends up half carrying her girlfriend back to the hotel room they'd decided to book at the last minute (after Chloe had reasoned that she would be too tired to make the drive back on the same day, which Max had chosen to hear as 'too drunk'; she'd chosen correctly).  
  
She's half a head shorter than Chloe, which makes it a challenge to bear the weight of her, and the rough denim of her jacket is rubbing into Max's shoulder and she can feel the slope of her hips and waist and Chloe's thigh keeps pressing into hers as they walk. She's constantly aware of Chloe's body even when she's not touching it, but now, it's all that she can think about, the only thing she's capable of perceiving. When they get back to the hotel room, Chloe is on her, grabbing Max's bag and dropping it to the carpet for her before she makes a poor attempt to pick her up in her arms. They stumble towards the bed together, Chloe laughing and Max dizzy with want.  
  
It should be easy to allow Chloe to continue. Max is pressing up against her in all the right places, and she makes herself be bold, kissing Chloe on the jaw, taking in the smell of the Axe body spray she seems to insist on using solely because the scent bothers the hell out of Max. She scrapes her hands against Chloe's back and kisses her hungrily, and this should be _easy_ , because she's with the girl she loves, the only person she's ever loved like this, but— but—  
  
But she can remember what it was like to feel completely helpless and immobile, literally paralyzed. She can remember not knowing her own body, mentally running away from it while screaming, fleeing what was happening to her while living in it. Suffocating in it.  
  
Somewhere between wanting Chloe and needing Chloe, she becomes afraid of her, and before she can stop herself, Max is planting her hands against her chest and shoving her off. Something explodes inside of her, making her feel like she's being throttled from the inside, and Max squirms violently, hips bucking up from the bed to dislodge the girl on top of her. Chloe moves immediately, ripping up and away from her with a look of alarm.  
  
"I can't," Max sobs, hands lifting to cover her face as she twists her body away from Chloe's, wanting to retreat inside of herself and never emerge again.  
  
"Okay! Yes, I _know_ , s'fine," Chloe's saying, her words running together through the blur of alcohol. "I'm sorry— c'mon, sit up."  
  
Max hates this. Chloe hasn't done anything wrong. And it's her birthday. They'd had a perfect day together, and they're somewhere far from home, and, up until now, she'd been feeling pretty good. All she can feel now is fear drowning out the inside of her and setting her adrift. For a moment, all she can do is keep reminding herself where she is, telling herself that she's not _there_ any more, that she hasn't been there in a long time, that she'll never have to go back again.  
  
_I'm here. I'm here._  
  
Chloe's not touching her. Max wishes she would get upset about it. She doesn't. Max wants her to be.  
  
"Why?" she manages, her voice cracking.  
  
"I'm sorry," says Chloe immediately, misinterpreting. "I drank _way_ too much—"  
  
"Why aren't you _angry_?" Max asks. Her eyes feel dry and stinging. She lifts her hands and grinds her knuckles into the lids. Stars spark out in the blackness of her vision. "This is so dumb. It's always so _stupid_. I'm so sorry. You probably think I'm—"  
  
"I probably think you're going to say something insane, because why would I be _angry_ at you?" Chloe interjects incredulously.  
  
Max slowly sits up. The slimy feeling spreading out over her skin is slowing to a dull, below-the-surface throb. She looks down at her lap. "You've... I mean, you've probably had relationships before where... where you could touch her and she wouldn't... she wouldn't be like _this_." Max closes her eyes. The stars keep spiraling there.  
  
"Okay, no." Chloe sounds a lot more sober. "Totally irrelevant to what is going on now. _You're_ what's going on now." Chloe's trying to peel the sheets back with a determined look on her face, motioning for Max to crawl up the bed, and then she's pulling her grinder off of the nightstand and unscrewing it from the center. Max watches her.  
  
"What's _wrong_ with me?" she asks. Her own voice sounds so miserable that she doesn't even recognize it.  
  
Chloe looks at her sideways. "Literally nothing," she says. "All that shit considered, you're doing pretty fucking good, Max."  
  
It doesn't feel that way. "But you're used to being able to... you know..."  
  
There's silence. "I've never been with a girl," says Chloe finally, picking through the little buds of weed.  
  
Max is surprised. She remembers finding condoms in Chloe's jacket pockets once, shortly after reuniting with her, and not knowing what they were right away, having never seen one before. She remembers feeling the ring squish around beneath the foil and realizing what they were, hurriedly shoving them deep back inside of Chloe's coat, her face burning red. Somehow, learning that her childhood best friend was having sex had deeply embarrassed her. She felt, distinctly, like she had uncovered something very private, something she was not supposed to know.  
  
But there had always been something bizarre about trying to imagine Chloe with a man. Max had heard her express interest several times — Chloe seemed to have no qualms about noting the sexual appeal of whatever men fit her tastes — but it was still impossible to visualize it. Chloe trying to seduce a man. Stripping down for one. Taking him inside of her, making herself vulnerable and open. Max had never been able to imagine it. She still can't.  
  
But she'd always been able to imagine Chloe making love to her. What Chloe's head might look like sinking down between her thighs. How her breasts would feel pressed up against her own. What the smooth slope of her ass might be like in Max's hands. What it would be like to seal her mouth over one of Chloe's pierced nipples and just suck. More than that, she can easily imagine Chloe _enjoying_ these things, that gleaming grin on her face, her hair faded out the colors of a morning sky on the pillow beneath her. Max wants that for Chloe. She wants it for herself.  
  
"So if it's about what I'm missing," Chloe is continuing with a shrug, "then I don't know _what_ I'm missing."  
  
Maybe it's selfish, but it makes Max feel better somehow, soothing an insecurity and inadequacy she'd been applying to herself without even meaning to. But she has expectations, and she'd be a fool not to know that Chloe must have them, too. It's not enough just to want Chloe. It's not enough to be okay with continuing on like this, stagnating in her own body.  
  
Chloe is right there, and something inside of Max won't let her have her. It just won't let her.

   
  


Max decides that confronting her anxiety, facing it down and forcing past it, has to be the only way to overcome it. Inaction is what has only paralyzed her further. She has endured worse things, she thinks. Things that had been, at the time, so much scarier and riskier and more frightening. She loves Chloe. She trusts Chloe. Chloe won't let anything bad happen to her. Max keeps repeating these things to herself. She knows, logically, that she has no reason to be afraid of Chloe. None of this is Chloe's fault.  
  
She's usually not the forward one. Max has been talking herself up for days, and it's because she keeps talking herself back down that she hasn't gone for it. The compulsion to give in and go for it happens sudden and sharp late into an evening, when they're on a late night run for Chloe's cigarettes. They sit out in the parking lot of the 7/11, Chloe filling the cabin with smoke as she gets a cigarette in before they head back out on the road. The urge overpowers Max, and she thinks, _Just go for it,_ and she throws herself across the console to lock her arms around Chloe's shoulders and press their mouths together.  
  
Chloe makes a sound of shock that Max absorbs with her tongue. The hand holding the cigarette thrusts out of the window to drop it to the asphalt, and Max can hear the heel of her palm banging around as she tries to find the knob to roll the window up. She's immediately responsive, melting kisses back into Max's mouth, her tongue a narrow barb on Max's teeth.  
  
And, sure, she tastes like cigarette ash, but a certain feeling starts to smoulder low inside of Max's body, a warmth that stains her in reds and golds and Chloe's blues. It's a feeling she's approached before, one that's always inevitably stopped her cold, shaking. But every time she feels it, there's the promise of _more_ , of getting closer to Chloe, of being able to sink into her _soul_ , not just her body.  
  
She wants that so badly.  
  
Max's hip is digging painfully into the console, so she undoes her seat belt and sort of crawls over it to gain some leverage on her girlfriend. She tilts her head into the kiss, telling herself that she can do this, she can overcome it, and it's _good_ , it's really good in those first couple of minutes, but the pleasure of it doesn't last long before the warning comes. It never does. It starts as a sense of mild alarm somewhere in the far corner of her mind and spreads out like ink on paper. Max forces herself past it this time, takes her fear and shoves it down.  
  
It's fine, she's _fine_ —  
  
She'll never forget that look on his face. Never. She'll never be able to forget how he'd looked at her like he was a god she should never have made the mistake of angering—  
  
—she's _fine_.  
  
" _Mnngh_ ," groans Chloe throatily. Max has pressed her hand up her side, under her shirt, splayed her fingers out over the sharp bones in her rib cage. Chloe's hands are wandering, too. They're hesitant; all of the bad experiences they've had so far have rendered Chloe somewhat reluctant and cautious in her touches. But Max seals away her fear and gives no sign of protest, so Chloe's touch turns bolder. Her fingers hook beneath the band of Max's bra.  
  
Panic blooms inside of her. Max twitches. _No_ , she thinks, _I don't think I can do this,_ and she's suppressing a scream. Chloe rocks into her again, her fingers dipping beneath, rolling under the curve of her breast. Max tells herself that she just has to endure. She has to get past her fear for Chloe. Her head is starting to hurt the way it had whenever she'd overuse her powers.  
  
Chloe makes a motion as if to push her seat back, feeling around the side again. That forces her to pull away a little, and when she does, she murmurs, her voice a cold front on Max's mind, "What's this all about?"  
  
Max thinks she's talking about the fact that they're in her truck, still in the lot, just out of the focus of one of the orange streetlights. "It's dark," she starts. "No one's going to see—"  
  
"Not that." Chloe's rolling her seat back slightly. "You, all over me—"  
  
At that, Max grounds herself back in what had brought her to this plan in the first place, and she tries to slide the rest of the way over on the console right onto Chloe's lap. Chloe freezes.  
  
"I want to keep going," says Max, and she's breathless. There's a siren in the back of her head, telling her that it's not okay, that she's not fine. "Okay? It's fine. I want to." She's getting dizzy. She doesn't know how much longer she can keep forcing this. Chloe just has to let her—  
  
Chloe doesn't give her the answer she's expecting.  
  
"No," she says.  
  
Max pulls back to stare at her. The thudding of her heart rolls out like distant thunder. "But I—"  
  
"No way, Max." Chloe sounds achy. "I can feel how tense you are. We'll wait."  
  
It's the first time Chloe's ever stopped her instead of Max telling her that she wants to stop, and Max doesn't know what to do with that. She slowly sinks back into her seat, stunned. Relief then chokes her, cuts through the shock, and she is suddenly desperately glad that Chloe had stopped her. Max finally lets the fear crash through her, and it has her shaking. She does her seat belt back up, mollified by the mental and emotional distress of pushing herself that hard — it really does feel a lot like what pushing her powers to the limits had been like — and watches as Chloe pushes her seat back up and starts up the truck.  
  
"Don't _do_ that, Max," she says suddenly, angrily, five minutes into the drive.  
  
"Do what?" Max asks, even though she already knows.  
  
"Force it. Don't do that. You really freaked me out."  
  
_Don't cry,_ she tells herself, but she's sniffing hard, nodding. "I know."  
  
Chloe's voice softens. "Let's not do that again, okay?" Her hand reaches out from the wheel and touches Max's forearm lightly— as if to say that it's there for her if Max wants to take it.  
  
With this kind of touch, she doesn't hesitate. She holds Chloe's hand on the drive home.

   
  


It starts to not matter. Chloe is right: they can have a perfectly sustainable relationship without it, at least on the surface. A sort of numbness starts to take over. Chloe adopts a hands-free approach, showing a remarkable amount of restraint. Every day, Max thinks about it. Every day, she can't bring herself to do anything about it.  
  
She starts to think that maybe having Chloe's hands on her can help her forget what it was like to have someone else's there. Maybe Chloe's hands can wipe away the pressure of fingertips she keeps re-experiencing every night. She's never thought about it like that before. Until now, it's been wanting to normalize herself, to share something that's felt important to have with Chloe. Suddenly it seems more important than that. It seems like, maybe, it's just been biding its time.  
  
"Do you ever think about it?"  
  
She's standing by the sliding door, staring at Chloe out on the balcony, where she's smoking and watching the rain come down. Chloe sort of looks back at her over her shoulder with her eyebrows raised, like, _What?_  
  
Max clarifies, "Like, you know..." She makes a vague motion with her index and middle fingers.  
  
"Don't—" Chloe sputters. "Don't make the hand sign for scissoring, Max, _Jesus_." Max drops her hand. "Yes, I think about it. And other stuff, too. Don't worry, nothing _that_ freaky." She's looking at her warily. "What's up?"  
  
"I don't know." Max slips out from the door and joins her on the balcony, putting her elbows on the wet railing. Chloe reaches out and rubs a hand between her shoulder blades. There's a silence that is not uncomfortable. Max watches the rain burst on the pavement below.  
  
"What we've got is pretty fucking perfect without it," says Chloe suddenly.  
  
Max looks at her. "You think so?"  
  
But she doesn't have to wait for Chloe to elaborate to know that she's right. What she has with Chloe is more than enough, a thousand times better than anything she could have imagined or expected. Even with the ugly things that had brought them together to begin with. Max would redo it all again in all the exact same ways.  
  
"Yeah. No pressure or anything, but if you wanted to stay together forever, I'm totally into that idea." Chloe wiggles her eyebrows at her, grinning. Max finds herself smiling. She hasn't needed Chloe's hands on her to make her complete. She just needs her around to make her strong.

   
  


When it comes to her, when the ache returns, it's not because of any specific thing. Looking back on it later, Max won't be able to identify what's different, just that something is. She's been changing imperceptibly, and so has Chloe. It's only now that she's stopped looking for those changes that they take effect.  
  
They're on the couch again, and Max is draped over her; the stereo is playing the kind of music Max still doesn't care for no matter how much Chloe exposes her to it, but that's okay. She has her face buried in the soft flannel of Chloe's shirt. It has that old book sort of smell, that dusty thrift store smell that Max has become used to smelling on Chloe when she returns from work every day. It's that, and the Axe, and the flowery smell of her freshly dyed hair, and the heady, sweet smoke curling from her pipe. Max has been breathing it in on each of Chloe's exhales. She feels warm. Loose. She runs a hand down Chloe's side.  
  
Chloe gives a little sound of approval and turns in to her, her slim thighs falling apart so that Max can snuggle up between them and nuzzle into her chest. She does, pressing her cheek to Chloe's tattooed shoulder. She runs her fingernail up the red ribbon lashing through it. Chloe presses slow kisses down the side of her neck.  
  
When the warmth starts, it's not because she's waiting for it. That's what makes her fail to realize that it's building at all. Max rolls with her, wanting to get above her, beneath her, next to her, into her. She's hooking her thighs over Chloe's lap, pressing her ass down on Chloe's crotch, and Chloe is breathing with increasing excitement and arousal, whispering, " _Fuck,_ Max."  
  
Max's shorts are thin cotton with an elastic at the hips. Chloe's shaking hands seem to have the potential to just rip them entirely, but she's patient as she tugs them down. It feels strange to have someone pull her shorts down for her, someone else's hands swishing the fabric down her thighs and then rubbing back up them to cup at her ass, but she finds that she likes it a lot.  
  
She's tugging at Chloe's shirt, and she pushes it off down Chloe's arms. Chloe helps, rolling her shoulders back with a sharp movement, and then she dives against Max, looping an arm around her waist and launching forward so that Max's back hits the cushions. Chloe rears back and throws her shirt to the carpet, and then she reaches for her tank top. Max's eyes are instantly drawn to her abs and the way they twitch beneath her pale skin as she leans back in to kiss her. She's covered by the shadow of Chloe's body, melting into it. It's good. It's right. It feels _natural_.  
  
Chloe's stomach is smooth and soft even with the hard muscle underneath. Max feels it jump beneath her fingers. She kisses Chloe wetly as they writhe together to a rhythm and pace she doesn't remember setting.  
  
When Chloe's hands pause in the middle of pulling Max's shirt off, like she's waiting for an answer or a gunshot at the starting line, their eyes meet, and Max nods. Chloe loosens a raspy groan as she peels it off and looks down at her exposed body. Max feels a chill— not because it's cold in the room, but because Chloe's eyes on her are making her feel so exposed to everything. But it's not a frost threatening to numb her and close her off; it's a slow burn, warming her up and melting her into honey. Chloe's broad hands close up over her breasts and massage her greedily, and Max writhes, wanting, _wanting_.  
  
It's not easy to get Chloe's bra off, but she helps, stuttering a laugh into Max's collarbones as she fumbles. Chloe rolls her spine and reaches around and whips the hook undone, just like that, and the bra falls down her arms and gets in the way of Chloe's groping hands. She casts it off with an irritated noise. Max looks up at Chloe's body, the valleys and shadows of what she can see. The bars through her nipples catch the milky light from the television, and Max is drawn to them, reliving every little fantasy she's ever had about them at once. She recalls all the times that Chloe would choose not to wear a bra, and Max would be able to make out the piercings right through her clothes, little bumps right by her nipples. Being able to see exactly where they were through her shirts would fluster Max so badly that she had taken to not looking in Chloe's direction at all.  
  
But now she doesn't feel any need to pretend they're not there; now she just wants to touch Chloe, she _wants_ her, and Max's pulls her hands up Chloe's chest and she runs her thumbs over her nipples, hooking over the bars. Chloe immediately responds with a sharp sound, and Max's fingers pull back in alarm. "No, it doesn't hurt," Chloe hisses before she even has the chance to ask. "Do it again."  
  
Max is wary, but she does as Chloe asks, bringing her fingertips back up to Chloe's nipples. They've already gone hard, standing perked up tall above the bars, and, _god_ , Max wants to taste her. Chloe seems to read her mind, because she says, "Never did run into the chance to know what it feels like to have them sucked on ever since I got them, and that's _why_ I got them. Just saying. Hella lame."  
  
"Just saying, huh?" Max says, and she even manages to sound playful.  
  
Chloe's smile is lewd, and it's sexy as hell, and with a moan, Max leans in to suck one of Chloe's nipples into her mouth. The bar clicks against her teeth. She lashes her tongue against it and gets it so wet that it slides easily when she nips at it, trying to be gentle.  
  
"Oh, _fuck_ , Max, what the _fuck?_ " Chloe is whimpering, but Max knows that tone. She knows what Chloe sounds like when she's horny and waiting for more. She's been hearing Chloe like this for more than a year now.  
  
Max loves the tactile feeling of it against her tongue, the soft bud of Chloe's nipple and the hard steel threaded through it. She could do this forever, she thinks. She could just sink into this and let it go on for an eternity, listening to Chloe moan for her. It wouldn't be a bad way to go. One of Chloe's arms is cradling her head to her chest, and her back is arched like she's something feral.  
  
Any moment now, this is going to shatter and fall in on itself. Max keeps waiting for it to happen. It feels too perfect to be right. Months ago, this would have made her very afraid, but Chloe is holding tight to her, and she doesn't feel trapped or cornered. She feels relieved, like she's exposing herself to a purifying heat, like she's needed this, like she's coming home to it.  
  
Max tears away to breathe, and she intends to go for the other nipple, but Chloe catches her mouth in a sudden kiss, speaking hot and fast against her lips. "What d'you think you're doing," she's groaning, her voice a viscous bass, "getting me all hot for you like this, _god_ , Max, you do it so well, you do it all the time, you don't even _know_ —"  
  
"I do," says Max back, low and rushed and searing, and she keens when Chloe's hands squeeze her tits firm enough to make her jump. "I know, I know—"  
  
They shut each other up with more kisses, tongues lashing, and Chloe slips a hand down Max's stomach, where it stops at the softest part of her belly, right between her hips. Chloe's fingers press into the flesh like she's waiting. It's reminiscent of moments they've lived a dozen time before, Chloe's fingers seeking, Max recoiling in revulsion.  
  
But not this time. Max just rocks her hips and says " _Yeah_ ," and Chloe slides her hand into her panties. She digs the heel of her palm into Max's pubic mound and strokes her fingers over the sweaty groove where her leg meets her crotch. Max whimpers. There's something electric about having Chloe's fingers _so_ close to the one place she's never shared with anybody else, but not quite touching. Chloe rubs the inside of her thigh like she knows it, too, like she's thinking of the exact same thing. Max winds her kisses over Chloe's cheek and up to her ear, feeling wild, her world going kaleidoscope and chaotic.  
  
"Chloe," she bubbles reverently, and Chloe laughs hot into her ear. It sounds triumphant. Her fingers hook up and tent the cotton of Max's panties, but when she's cocking her wrist and sliding her index and middle finger down Max's slit, pushing past her folds. Max jerks her hips up and cries out, and she expects that at any moment she's going to feel like something inside of her is shredding her on its way out, but it never comes. She waits for other shoe to drop, and it doesn't.  
  
There's just Chloe. Chloe heavy on top of her, all giddy reciprocation. Chloe's fingers working slow against Max's pussy like she's savoring the opportunity just to touch it. Max's body is not her own, but it's not Chloe's, either, and it's not _anyone's_. It's something else. Something better. She draws a knee up and spreads herself needily. Chloe laughs and dips her fingers towards her hole. A thought drifts into Max's mind: Chloe always paints her nails, but she keeps them short. She's glad for that.  
  
The pressure of Chloe's hands is a cleansing heat, blasting her with scalding water, compressing her. Sloughing off the dead skin she's been wearing around to expose a new, scarless layer. Max feels like she's breathing through water, purples and blues blooming in her vision, light filtering in from above.  
  
She's already wet, dripping down the crack of her ass, and Chloe's probing finger goes in easily. Max squirms, feeling her skin burst hot all over, like Chloe's poured magma into her through her kisses. Chloe thrusts into her shallowly, and when Max starts to relax a little, she offers her a second finger, rubbing them both against the sensitive spot just beyond her entrance. Max knows where it is and what it feels like, but she often exhausts herself trying to pleasure herself that way on the rare occasions that she masturbates, tiring from having to use two hands. Chloe seems to feel none of that exhaustion; she grinds her fingers into Max like she's been thinking of exactly how she's wanted to go about doing it for ages. There's a rhythm to it that's not practiced, but it's eager.  
  
Max is losing hold of herself. Each stroke of Chloe's fingers inside of her makes her quake and whimper and she can hear her pussy sounding wetter and wetter, Chloe's fingers beckoning more and more out of her. Max slaps a hand against Chloe's back and tries to find something to grip onto. She settles for Chloe's short hair, dragging her eager mouth against her throat. She moans particularly sharp when Chloe seems to hit a stride, shocking her with pleasure.  
  
"So fuckin' perfect," Chloe breathes, her breath hot and damp on Max's chin, her raking fingers moving sloppily inside of her. "You want me to keep going? You want more?" She seems to be thoroughly enjoying herself, asking for Max to reaffirm it for her in a tone that's all possessive, wanton need.  
  
"Yes," Max pleads, and she really means it, she really, really does.  
  
"Fuck yeah," Chloe hums, and she starts fucking Max harder with her fingers, like she can't get enough of it. The vigor of it mounts Max very suddenly and abruptly to the point of utter overstimulation. Her clit feels so swollen that when Chloe pushes her thumb up to briefly touch it, she implodes.  
  
She doesn't know what she says when she comes. It might be, _Fuck_ , or _Shit,_ or maybe _Chloe_. It's definitely not _Wowser_ , as Chloe had teased her it might be before. Whatever it is, she half shrieks it, and she gets a pleased groan from Chloe in response. Her fingers work slow and deep inside of her as Max's hips quake and jump off of the worn leather. She's left with a sharp throbbing all throughout the lower half of her body. She feels like she's overheating, like she's been left under a direct light for a very long time. Chloe's light.  
  
Chloe pulls up, and she looks so _smug_ , like she wants to say something, and Max feels such a rush of want for her that she doesn't let her pull off whatever one-liner she'd been contemplating, reaching to tear down Chloe's shorts and underwear in one motion. Chloe is extremely accommodating, giving her hips a shake and kicking them both away. Max digs an elbow back into the couch and sits up. She can feel her own wetness cooling beneath her ass, but instead of embarrassing her, it just riles her up more and renews her excitement. She slides a hand up the inside of Chloe's thigh.  
  
"Wait, wait," Chloe says, and Max wonders, for a brief moment of disappointment, if they're going to be stopping, but all Chloe does is pull her forward by the hips and say, "Get on top of me." Max moves as if to pin her down, but Chloe says, "No, _backwards_." She's leaning back into the cushions, and Max suddenly gets it. She flushes.  
  
"Are you sure—"  
  
"Do I want that ass of yours in my face? Uh, _yes_." Chloe grabs her by the hips again, and that's all the reassurance Max needs. She crawls around on the couch until she's climbing over Chloe backwards. This gives her a top-down view of Chloe's crotch, and she makes herself look, feeling absurdly embarrassed. She's seen her girlfriend nude before, but never so closely. Max reaches, mesmerized, to squeeze at Chloe's thigh. Chloe is mostly shaved except for a strip of neatly trimmed blonde hair, and Max half expects to reach to touch her and uncover some kind of genital piercing. Either way, she's excited, and she delves her fingers in between Chloe's legs. She can feel Chloe kissing her thighs, hands massaging her rear with unabashed lasciviousness.  
  
She's wet and scorching hot, her lips parting easy for Max's inexperienced fingers. Max pries her open just to _look_ at her, and Chloe seems to know what she's doing, because she says, "Are you just staring at it? Wondering where the clit piercing is, or are you just that happy to see a pussy?"  
  
"Guess," says Max, laughing, and with a tremor of excitement she uses a fingertip to ease the hood back on Chloe's clit.  
  
Chloe moans throatily as Max plays with it, unloading the answer in a whine: "I was too scared to get it d— d— _done_. Thought about it, though. Oh, _fuck_."  
  
The little nub goes hard beneath Max's swirling fingers. She thinks it's perfect just like this, just fucking delectable. "We'll keep it a secret," she coos. Chloe gives a groan of approval, lifting her hips from the couch when Max grinds her fingertips into her. Her breaths turn labored against her thigh, and then those breaths are suddenly very hot against her crotch, and she reminds herself that Chloe has probably been staring up at it this whole time. Chloe's saying something quietly, each syllable a puff of warm air against Max's still-sensitive clit. What pours out of her mouth has her ears burning.  
  
" _God_ , Max, I just wanna put my mouth on your cunt and just, like, make out with it, kiss your pretty little pussy _allll_ over—"  
  
"Oh my god!" Max is both horrified and aroused. It's so _Chloe_. She quakes, her fingers slowing against Chloe's slit.  
  
" _Sorry._ I just, like, I gotta be real with you. I think about it maybe once a day. Wanting to just go down on you and lick your—"  
  
Affection for Chloe bursts from her in the form of laughter. "Stop _talking_ like that! Just do it."  
  
Chloe's laughing, too, wheezing. "You mean make out with your p—"  
  
"Don't say it!" Max groans. "Just do it!"  
  
And Chloe doesn't waste any more time teasing her. Her dirty mouth closes over Max's cunt and her tongue lashes up against her, soaking her further. Max writhes with the shock that comes with this new kind of sensation. She can't concentrate, her vision turning thick and hazy as Chloe's tongue makes quick work of her clit. Even the scrape of her teeth against the flesh feels good. Max feels like she's going to just collapse on top of her, dropping down against her, all of the energy drained from her body, like she's going to just suffocate her. She thinks Chloe might not mind.  
  
Chloe's moving with her, squirming beneath her, extraordinarily patient even against Max's uncertain touches. She feels selfish for drinking in all of this so greedily, grinding her hips back down against Chloe's mouth, slipping her fingers into Chloe's pussy and marveling at how wet she is, sucking it off of her fingers, finding that she doesn't mind the sharp taste at all.  
  
They move together so easily and naturally that they wind up tangled again face to face, and Chloe's half sitting up, and she has her arms under and around Max's sweaty back, and at one point she'd thrown a thigh over Max's hip and pressed their groins together and that's _it_ , that's it right there, Max is absolutely dying. There's nothing in the world that compares to what Chloe's cunt feels like pressed up against hers, the way they slide together so wet and swollen. Max is incoherent with pleasure, vocalizing without self-consciousness.  
  
She had imagined this before. She's not sure what she'd _expected_ , though, because whatever she had imagined isn't anything like this. She had never realistically envisioned what the slickness would be like. How slippery Chloe would feel as they press together. How she could feel the throbbing in Chloe's clit against her own— that last realization has Max moaning again.  
  
Chloe gives a bestial purr, and for a moment, Max doesn't know how this could be her first time doing something like this. Her hips move in slow, deliberate circles as she massages herself against Max, and Max closes her eyes and watches everything turn purple, turn blue. Chloe embraces her tighter, and Max wishes they could get close enough to kiss again, because she wants to kiss her, but she also wants to keep going like this forever.  
  
"I love you," she's whimpering, incoherent, like she's reached the end of a monologue and has nothing left to say but this one thing, "I love you, Chloe, I love you—"  
  
"I know," says Chloe, and Max is startled to realize that her voice is heavy with something, like she's choking on it. "I know. I know. I love you, too." She reaches up and cups Chloe's face with her hand, and Chloe smiles down at her— and then she throws her head back and thrusts harder against her, and Max is precisely in the moment with her. Chloe's free hand finds hers, and they hook their fingers together, squeezing. Just being able to hold Chloe's hand like this— once, this was the grip that had saved her. She'd saved Chloe so many times, but in the end, Chloe had saved her.  
  
They hit it together, bodies rocking sharply, ricocheting off of one another. Chloe gets there before Max, who's still struggling against her pleasure, but feeling the way she shudders into her gets her there. Max feels ragged with pleasure, like Chloe's touches have been abrading her body, turning her skin raw everywhere. Chloe's thrusting hips fade to stutters, and Max can actually feel the tension start to drain out of her, can feel the center of her mass shift.  
  
Chloe's legs are still locked with hers, and their hands are still sealed together. They stay tangled like that as they come down from it, like they're links in the same chain. Max lets her head sink to Chloe's sweaty shoulder. Eventually, Chloe shifts, but only enough to be able to haul Max closer, bodily. She wraps around her, both arms and legs, and for once Max is really glad that she's small. Chloe noses into her hair, and her mouth moves. Max anticipates what she might say. _I love you_ again, maybe. Something that feels as dreamy as she does right now.  
  
Instead, Chloe says, "If I knew it was gonna be today, I'd have worn cuter underwear."  
  
Max bursts out laughing. It's a rude awakening from her trance, but that's Chloe. She kneads her hands into her back. "I don't think I ever even _saw_ it."  
  
"Still. And I have crotch stubble."  
  
"I don't even shave!" Max yelps.  
  
"Yeah, it's cute as hell," Chloe shoots back. She turns her head. Max tilts her chin up. Chloe's looking down at her with a huge grin on her face. Max knows that look well. She's seen it at a thousand sleepovers and over a thousand secrets. She's known the girl behind it, all her hurts and her dreams and her wants and losses. Max adores her so much. "What are you giving me the moon eyes for?"  
  
"You," is all Max can think of to say in response. It's not enough. It's everything. "Just you."  
  
Chloe seems to get it. her expression softens, and she leans in to kiss her.  
  
"All yours," she says.  
  
Max is still waiting for it to come back. She's waiting for the shivers to start from far inside of her body, for the disgust and shame and horror and deep, deep sorrow to wash over her and set her afloat, sending her far away from Chloe. She waits. And waits. It doesn't come. She tries to remember it, to force herself to relive the feeling of it. She finds that she can't. There's only Chloe's hands. Chloe's patience. Chloe. Hers.  
  
It's alright to drown in it. It's finally alright.  
  
This time, it's Max's turn to say, "I know." She combs her fingers through Chloe's hair. Chloe looks beyond her shoulder and out of the window into the dark sky.  
  
"Look," she says. Max turns her head to see her smiling, her eyes lit up by the moon. "It's started to rain."

**Author's Note:**

> Come find me on Tumblr [here](http://mjrrgr.tumblr.com), if you'd like. 
> 
> Comments, critique, questions— all are encouraged and appreciated.


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